The Girl From Nowhere
by Skade
Summary: No one ever knew what to do with Samantha Snape... (A/U, has its own webpage at www.covingtoninnovations.com/sharon/girlfromnowhere/)
1. The Voices In Her Head

Chapter One - The Voices in her Head

**The Girl**   
**_from_**   
**Nowhere**

-

_Chapter One  
The Voices in her Head_

-

No one really knew what to do with Samantha.

She was already one of those wickedly twisted and born a tad... _off_ souls. She was really, truly, different, and people who tried to figure her out often ended up with a headache. At least. One sadly inquisitive psyciatrist went so bad that he began analizing and treating himself.

Around Samantha, madness _was_ a contagious disease.

Even before that curse.

It really wasn't her fault that Dumbledore had talked her into being a traitor, and it therefore wasn't really her fault that she had been found out. (It was all because she was honest with the Headmaster, telling him everything, not letting old grudges get in the way. So she couldn't be blamed if she liked to hide behind lies nowadays.) And you can't punish someone just because their master discovered that they were a traitor to flew into a fit of rage and didn't have the time to fling an Unforgivable at her as she ran away so instead he flung something else much more horrible...

Could you?

Of course you couldn't.

Of course, her screaming as they shoved the straightjacket over her head didn't help much. Yelling that you were absolutely fine and that curse didn't do anything to you doesn't go over well when you're trying to bite someone's arm off.

People clucked their tounges, said it was coming anyway (the poor dear risking her life like that and ending up like this) and the Ministry should really do something (but until then I'll go fix a sympathy card for the family). And yet, there was no family, and she was still affected by the curse, even more insane then she was at the start.

Samantha Snape became the object that the Wizarding World flung their pity at and cooed over and said their oh-you-poor-dears about.

She hated it. Of course. All these people being perfectly forgiving and nice and wonderful, while she was still her stingy, mean self.

There was only one thing to do. She ran away.

Not _far_ away, mind you, just to some nameless crowded city. She was in one of the gray-beige buildings that was an apartment complex. The Ministry gave her an ample flow of money. Messing with proven insane people was not a good idea, so they were quite happy to fling galleons and pounds at her. Quite enough to get an apartment, and buy out the ones around it when the neighbors began complaining about her, and to keep the landlady happy anyway...

In the middle of the room, she streched, arms and back making one not-quite-perfect arc. It annoyed her, so she streched farther, to the point it was painful. No use, she would never be perfect. She never was, after all...

It was morning, and mornings aggravated her because she had to decide what kind of day it would be. Maybe an angry day, where the slightest thing out of place sent her into a fit of rage, or a sad day where she could hardly stop sobbing to see where she was going, or maybe a happy day where she acted as if she had taken some sort of drug, and those days she almost thought she did because the next day was surely horrible after a happy day... Thankfully, those days didn't come easy. And after that, what would she do? Would this be a day where she would starve herself and have nothing more than a pint at the Leaky Cauldron while Black and Potter taunted her as always, or would she eat eight full meals until she was sick?

Samantha blinked and squinted into the dusty sunrise.

She hated mornings.

That was when she remembered that her window faced _west_, not _east_...

"Well, I hate evenings then," she grumbled under her breath as she pulled a pair of jeans on. For some reason she had embraced Muggle culture after so many years of hating its proverbial guts, a sure sign for many that she had lost it. She was too busy being in rebellion from everything to really care.

She stood up suddenly and looked about the room in her jeans - just her jeans, no shirt, only her bra. She was odd like that, something would catch her eye after she had gotten halfway fully dressed, and she would wander around in just her pants or only her shirt...

Nothing had caught her eye this time, but a rather heavenly sound graced her ears, and she ran into the apartment's rather squashed kitchen to drown a teabag.

She still hadn't decided what kind of day - er, night - it was going to be as she strolled back into the main room with her cup of tea. With a sinking feeling, she realized it was going to be one of _those_ days that you didn't know how it was going to go. A mood-swingy, twisted, nasty with the potential of being heavenly day...

Samantha sat down on her bed with her properly sugared tea and was just about to take a sip when something interrupted her.

> _Don't you drink your tea with cream?_

Oh, no. She didn't feel like dealing with the voices in her head today...

> "No, _you're _the one who drinks tea with cream..."  
_...And Maggie's the one who likes lemon...  
_"...Maggie?"  
_Gasp! Samantha! You should be ashamed, not remembering the names of the voices in your own head...  
_"Well, I'm SO-rry, but we've never been properly introduced."  
_We can't exactly shake hands, Sam._  
"For the last time, don't call me Sam. Please?"  
_Awww, c'monnn, Sam! We're the voices in your head! You can trust us, cant'cha Maggie?  
_**Yep!**  
"Ohh... please... leave me to my tea in peace..."  
**But don't we make things so much more... interesting?**

As she slammed the teacup down, Samantha wondered how she could stand it some days. And that was just it. She couldn't.

Letting her muffled, frustrated scream come out from her snarl, she shoved about the clothes in her closet and pulled out a sweater. It was maroon, a gift from somebodyorother that was friends with Dumbledore. She had long forgotten the name, but it was the first thing she had pulled out and therefore she felt compelled to wear it. And it went with jeans. Everything went with jeans, but nothing quite fit with her black eyes and thin eyelashes and thick lips and hook nose and most of all her ugly, greasy, oily _hair_...

She sighed, staring at the hairbrush in her hand. It wouldn't do any good on her shoulder-length hair, she knew it wouldn't, so sometimes she asked herself why she even bothered. It was simple. Her hair looked even worse fully tangled then half-tangled.

There was a _tp-tp-tp_ sort of sound, and Samantha instinctively bawled "Go away!" only to realize it wasn't someone at the door but something at the window. Intrested, she let her frustration with her hair die as she jogged over to the window.

Upon seeing the owl, she opened the window. It was probably just another letter from Dumbledore. He sent them every-so-often, saturated in spells to make sure she hadn't killed herself, which she had tried once much to his dismay, especially since he was the one to talk her down from that windowsill...

Only, it wasn't from Dumbledore. There was a wax seal on the letter, yes, but it was in Slytherinic green, and when she opened the piece of parchment it did have the Hogwarts crest up top, but it wasn't from Dumbledore...

Samantha read the introduction paragraph. She read the second paragraph. She read the introductory paragraph again. The words sunk in.

She screamed, and flung the letter to the floor, jumping up and down on it as if some sort of voodoo would give the writer a magnificent backache in the morning. The first angry sob escaped her lips.

"I can deal with the voices in my head," she shrieked, "But receiving letters from myself is really the last straw!"

When she calmed herself down enough to continue reading the letter, her fears were confirmed. Another S. Snape, claiming to be Samantha in some sort of other world, had written the letter. After throwing the appropriate hissy fit, she fell back on something she always did in such situations. Rant.

"I'm a _schoolteacher?_ A _SCHOOLTEACHER?_ But I _hate _children! And - _Potions Master?_ I always slept through that class! They kept putting it early in the morning for me!" Furious, Samantha paced, waving the letter in the air as if throttling someone's throat. "And _WHAT?! _He got away _scot-free for spying? Only with a **Cruicio?**_ _I **hate** him!_"

Hyperventilating and red in the face, Samantha collapsed on her bed and brushed her hair out of her face as she read the last paragraph of the letter again.

"And he's _coming to meet me tonight at the Leaky Cauldron_?" She hissed, seething. "Isn't _that_ - just - _wonderful_, with Black right there to mock me - !"

Angry, yet feeling she had a duty to go, Samantha shoved on her leather jacket (though she didn't need it, it was warm out) and huffily made her way outside, slamming doors in her wake.

A few moments she was gone, having apparated, and the landlady at her knitting inside sighed...

-

A/N:

**Alanis Morissette induced stories** turn out to be sort of strange, so I certaintly hope it wasn't too bad. This first installment goes really well with her song _All I Really Want_ from her alblum _Jagged Little Pill_. I'll be working onwards through the story, explaining the title and diving deeper into Samantha's mad, mad soul and finally ending with a song from Morissette's latest CD _Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie_. It's really a great alblum, the both of 'em. Go out and buy each *G*

**Disclaimer blah junk:** C'mon, chant along with me. I do not own anything from the Harry Potter series or any of J.K. Rowling's related works, it all belongs to J.K. Rowling herself, not me. The idea is at least partially mine, mine, mine tho'... 


	2. The Known Stranger

Chapter Two - The Known Stranger

**The Girl**   
**_from_**   
**Nowhere**

-

_Chapter Two  
The Known Stranger_

-

The Leaky Cauldron was always busy.

At the moment, it had its four best customers. Well, three and a half, to be precise.

The half was because werewolves had a low tolerance for alcohol and only drank half as much as usual when transformed.

Laughing as they always did; James, Sirius, Lily and Remus (who happened to be the highly inebreated wolf sitting on the floor with a half-empty bowl of Guiness) sat in their usual places. They did this every Friday night, now, Harry was old enough to take care of his little sister for an evening. Old friends, as they always would be.

Nobody talked about Peter anymore.

As soon as the truth had been known, they rejected him immediately. Yelled. Screamed. Sirius tried to rip his throat out, even. Peter, to the Mauraders, simply _did not exist anymore_. They had felled the ultimate blow to him just before he was dragged to Azkaban. They had removed his name from the Map.

There was no more Peter Pettigrew to them anymore. No Wormtail. _Out of sight, out of mind_...

However, who _did_ stay in their minds now was Samantha. Because of her telling that Peter was a Deatheater, and the failed attempt on the Potter's lives, she was found out. All the Mauraders shivered when they thought of the price she had paid...

In the back of their minds, even though they knew it ment definite harm to the Potters, they almost wish she had been selfish and not told at all. It was horrible, what they knew she constantly went through. The torture that never ended of always, always having some flaw and never finding a true friend. And even worse was the fact that she still rejected them...

The topic was fresh on Sirius' mind, especially because he was talking about it.

He took another drink from his mug, and continued. "...That's really all I know about what happened to Samantha. It's a good thing that Dumbledore insisted on those hit wizards at the ready to storm the castle - took twenty of 'em before they could finally get 'is fingers unwrapped from 'er neck. Awful night, that." Sirius raised one eyebrow at the stranger and changed the subject. "Why 're you askin', anyway? It was all over the papers when it happened..."

The stranger looked at him for a second. He and Samantha _did _look similar, he'd admit... But there was something about the eyes that were different. Both pairs were black, yes, but the strangers reminded Sirius of dark tunnels and the shadows you saw when you looked down a well. He had always thought that Samantha's looked like a cat's that had been kicked one-too-many a time and had learned to attack when anyone came near.... The stranger's voice interrupted his chain of thoughts.

"We're... family," he said slowly...

It's not a lie, Severus thought to himself. But it's not the whole truth, either. It's a half truth. As long as he kept telling half truths, he would be fine.

"Brother and sister," he continued, faster this time. (It was true, in a way...) "I only found out a few weeks ago." (He had. That was true.)

His shoulder muscles untensed when Sirius seemed to accept the answer and nod. "Ah - so that's what it is. I knew you two looked the same. Twins, I'll bet, too... Still wonder why you didn't get all of the sympathy cards an' such. No family to send 'em too, you know, the fruit baskets, I heard the Ministry had a feast." Sirius took another deep drink.

Severus had to force himself not to pull on his hands out of nervousness. It was annoying, being so close to someone he hated - not infuriating, just annoying under the circumstances.

"Speak of the devil!" Sirius cried suddenly, pointing to the door. "There she is. You c'n go talk to 'er yourself."

The Potions Master took a long, hard look. _Samantha_ - that's what they said she was called. Didn't it mean _listener_...? She looked nice enough, he supposed. Angry, though, and he wouldn't ever wear such clothes...

Quietly, Severus slipped from his seat, forgetting his glass of vodka, and picked his way through the crowd, darting to where she had sat.

Samantha was not in a good mood.

She was rarely in good moods, but it never mattered much. What did she have to be happy about?

> _Sirius and James noticed when you came in..._

The little voice in the back of her head that had been so annoying before was now sort of comforting.

> I know.  
**And there's a bloke heading over to you.  
**I know.  
_And Sirius pointed you out to him._  
Great. I'm going to attempted to be picked up so I can be someone's trophy of the evening...  
_"Look, guys! I flirted with Samantha Snape tonight!"  
_Exactly. How did you know that?  
**C'mon, Samantha. We're not the voices in your head for nothing...**

However, "Maggie"'s advice was cut short, because the man was taking a seat next to her.

It only took one glance to realise who he was.

Severus smiled at her slightly agast expression.

"So," he said quietly, "You got the letter?"

Samantha glared at him sideways. "Yes," she said sulkily. "Why are you even bothering with me?"

"Because we need your help."

There was silence for a moment. "We?" she commented finally.

"Yes." He looked her in the eye. "Me. Hogwarts. The entire other world, perhaps."

Samantha shivered at the look in his eyes, and Severus twisted his hands nervously under the table at the look in her eyes.

Yet their eyes were still locked.

"What do you even want me for?" she said gruffly, bowing her head.

"A substitute." One of her eyebrows quickly went up. "Potions, for a large part of the year. I have to go into a Ministry job for awhile - I told you in the letter - and I need someone else... You can do anything with the class you'd like, aside from burning the classroom. I just need someone who I can trust."

She looked up at him with a curiously amused expression. "You think I'm trustworthy?"

He shrugged. "If I can't trust myself..."

"Then you have self-esteem issues," she finished smugly. "Besides, I hate children."

"I do too." He gave a rather venomous grin. "Half the fun's in torturing them."

She looked at him and smiled. "Done...

When do we leave, Severus?"

It was a longish trek to the portal between the universes from the Leaky Cauldron, and then they had to walk into and across the Hogwarts grounds. That, and the slight time difference between the two worlds, ment that just as the first streaks of dawn were appearing was when they arrived at the doors.

The walk had been entirely silent with the kind of queer quietness of people who know each other too well. There was the comfort of understanding someone, but the fact that they knew each other near perfectly was strange, and unsettling. Severus became used to Samantha's moodiness. Samantha became used to Severus' continuing mood of alert annoyedness. Both assumed the same reckless abandon to the student's reaction, because they knew that Dumbledore would introduce her as Severus' sister.

They entered, each feeling strangely calm from the quiet morning, and as refreshed as if they had slept.

And Samantha smiled, because it had been a long time since she had been to Hogwarts, and she resolved to pull on Fawkes' tail feathers when she got a chance.

---

**Disclaimer blah junk:** C'mon, chant along with me. I do not own anything from the Harry Potter series or any of J.K. Rowling's related works, it all belongs to J.K. Rowling herself, not me. The idea is at least partially mine, mine, mine tho'... 


End file.
